"The Life and Adventures of a
Provincial Soul" Akhtman deals with the predicament
of emigration from the Soviet Union at the moment of its collapse as a country,
culture and way of life. The past continues to exist as a linguistic and literary
memory, whereas the present is a primitive reality intemperate by culture. This
brings the author to the idea of fate, which for her plays a key role:
I think everyone is born with his fate and is free only in his ability to become aware of it
and of the world in which he finds himself, and to connect these given entities in his self.
So it is with the book I am now writing. I don’t know whether it exists in my fate as my
house and my emigration exist […] I believe it does exist, I feel it, and without it my fate
seems deficient – as if I were homeless and unable to begin a new life"